Boca Stockbroker Under Investigation

May 30, 1986|By Jim McNair, Business Writer

For the second time in three months, the FBI is investigating the possible misappropriation of customers` money by a Boca Raton stockbroker, this time a recently fired employee of Shearson Lehman Brothers.

No specific amounts of money were disclosed by either the FBI or Shearson Lehman Brothers, but the brokerage said it suspects that money was diverted from the accounts of two customers.

The broker under investigation by the FBI is Constantin Contogeorgos, a former Boca Raton resident who was employed by Shearson Lehman in 1982. Three other employees, including branch manager Frederick S. Asbeck of Delray Beach and brokers Charles Stoll and Richard T. Burt, have been dismissed for violating company rules and are not suspected of criminal wrongdoing, Shearson said.

Contogeorgos, who could not be reached for comment, was fired April 30. A Shearson Lehman spokeswoman in New York said Asbeck had initially been suspended last Friday but that he was dismissed for good Wednesday. Neither Asbeck nor the other two brokers could be reached for comment Thursday.

The spokeswoman said that the company first became suspicious of wrongdoing following an internal audit. It then turned its information over to the FBI. Since then, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Florida Department of Banking and Finance have both been told of the investigation.

``They (Shearson Lehman) notified us, they are cooperating, and it`s under active investigation,`` said Paul Miller, a spokesman for the FBI office in Miami. He said he could say no more.

In the earlier case, FBI agents arrested 23-year-old Merrill Lynch stockbroker Leslie Roberts on Feb. 14 for alleged mail fraud in connection with millions of dollars worth of bogus stock trades. Roberts, who also worked and lived in Boca Raton, is free on bond awaiting trial.